


(i think it’s you) the one who scatters white petals in my heart

by bubblelina



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: (but its mutual and neither of you realize it), Angst, Dorks in Love, F/M, Fluff, Friendship, Lalafell Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Love Confessions, Original Character(s), Patch 5.0: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Pining, Romance, Specific Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), but not as many as i wISH I COULD HAVE, i dump vague tidbits about my wols lore and run, many many many friend oc cameos, mild violence in part 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:14:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23355253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bubblelina/pseuds/bubblelina
Summary: or: the fifth season (winter, spring, summer, fall,—)or: it takes less than a year for the warrior of light to fall in love with g'raha tia. again, and again, and again, and again—"i'll tell you a story then—scholars believe five seasons existed during the time of the allagan empire, four of them being the ones we know of today.""and the fifth is..?"
Relationships: G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 2
Kudos: 36





	(i think it’s you) the one who scatters white petals in my heart

**Author's Note:**

> **gatheredfates asked windupnamazu a question:**   
>  _Because I love your g'raha/lunya content: when were the moment(s) where Lunya realised she was in love? Did it come suddenly or was it a slow burn? What specific actions/events triggered these feelings?_
> 
> notes: i borrowed a lot of friends' ocs from tumblr! whoopsie!  
> this is my first time posting on ao3 and its specifically because this is one WHOPPER of a prompt fill so im mirroring it here. oops. spring is dedicated to the mom squad for patiently waiting for me to finish this stupid thing for over a month <3
> 
> [title song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udGwca1HBM4)

****

**i. winter**

it starts with a fever.

so close to coerthas as it is, mor dhona is not easily freed from winter's frosted grasp. still, lunya had hoped that the snowball fight outside of camp dragonhead with majj and sati the morning before—the same one she _tried_ to sit out on because "we are adults, majj, and _a'satina lhea don't give me that look!_ "—wouldn't amount to more than an uncomfortable chill down the back of her coat for the rest of the day. luck hadn't been on her side for once, and now that she thought about it, the astrologer they'd spoken to right after that was awfully sniffly...

(ah, her eternal nemesis. her weak immune system.)

when she wakes with a temperature rivaling that of the stomach of mount o'ghomoro, feeling like she'd taken a skull sunder to the head, she's in the tent she shares with raha at saint coinach's find. it's not a surprise—theo and rjoli might have just judged it safer to keep her here than try to cart her back to revenant's toll—but the crystal floor is freezing and her body can't quite decide if that's a good thing or not, even while her blankets are lined with layers of fire shards and there's a little ceruleum heater chugging away in the corner of the tent courtesy of the ironworks.

getting up to turn off the heater feels tempting. so does getting up to turn it up even more. but her limbs, leaden with sweat and fever, make the executive decision for her to do _neither_. instead she remains curled into the world's tiniest lump beneath the pile of quilts she vaguely recognizes as not entirely hers and waits for sleep to reclaim her, the scent of vanilla and catmint lulling her mind somewhere far from the dinky little tent and the noisy puttering of the heater.

"—should just leave her be," an unfamiliar voice argues somewhere outside, clearer than the rest of the perpetual din of the find and enough to irritatingly pull her back to consciousness. it's likely just some lower-ranking son of saint coinach; one of rammbroes' little goons that he never bothered to name to her. "she's a warrior of light, a cold will not kill her."

" _enough,_ " barks someone else, this voice sharp yet gruff, like a blade cutting through plum blossoms with more force than necessary. hanami normally sounds grumpy but lunya starts to pay attention anyway. "i will talk to rammbroes." it's a simple enough statement, but when hanami says _talk_ with that natural intensity of hers it really means _vice grip into accepting_. "if lunya does not feel well enough to go, none of us will."

"this is _inane_ , do none of you practice rational thought—" 

a third speaker pipes up, and the sound of raha speaking clear and warm like milk with honey has her fully perk up, fighting the dizzying haze of her headache. "the warriors of light are the one thing between us and death. you do not want to argue with any of them, and certainly not _this one_."

hanami says something that sounds an awful lot like a threat to raha as their unknown party member hems and haws, and lunya covers her ears while the three of them get a little too loud for her poor head to handle. by the time she manages to push her headache down for a bit the argument is blessedly over and raha is crouched by her side. his smile is a flash of much needed warmth from the winter sun, and for some fever-riddled reason there's something fascinating about the rise and fall of his chest beneath his thick whisperfine coat, her expert stitches rolling perfectly over the curves of his arms.

"...ha," lunya rasps in acknowledgement, her breath visible in the thin stream of light that slips through the tent fold. raha makes a sympathetic noise at her when she sniffles, apparently taking pity on her for today. 

"i made soup for you," he says, setting a tray down on the floor. though the bowl of soup looks like something she won't immediately hurl up, the line of colourful and likely disgusting potions next to it has lunya grimacing already. "i fear it won't match up to your highly refined taste buds, but i hope you can grant me the honor of stomaching it."

 _never mind, he's still a brat,_ lunya thinks tiredly, wondering if she should croak for zaya to come and kick him in the gut for her. even _thinking_ about bantering back right now strengthens her headache, so instead she snuffs a cough in the elbow of her tunic and manages to say, "told th'others to leave me be."

"the _others,_ " raha echoes, grinning so brightly she has half a mind to throw a blanket over his face so she won't have to be blinded for longer. "you have yet to shoo me out."

" _could_ ," she grumbles. her words stick to her mouth as she tries to say them, so she wiggles one hand free from her blanket cocoon to make a grabbing gesture at him. their fingers brush as he hands her flask over with a raised eyebrow, and there's a silent, teasing question in his eyes that says _do you need help drinking this?_

the weak glare she shoots at him in return hisses _i can still break your wrist like this, furbrain_ , and with a low chuckle that is all but a purr he settles down beside her on the bedroll, picking up an empty bowl from the tray and setting about getting it filled with water from a crystal as she drinks. 

"you gotta go talk to 'hnami," lunya mumbles once she's put her flask aside, sliding further beneath her quilts until only her eyes and her bangs, slick with a fevered sweat, are visible. "they can't put off the expedition for me."

raha squints at her, not quite smiling but definitely still amused as he reaches out to brush her hair from her forehead. his fingers are still cool to the touch after his trek through the camp, and on impulse she kicks at her blankets in frustration when he removes them to dip a washcloth in his bowl of water. "i would still be here even if they hadn't." 

(later, hanami easily gives her the truth that _raha_ was the one who called a rain check on the expedition until she was better.

"he is an idiot," the older warrior grumbles, but she does a poor job at hiding a small smile that lunya feels blessed to see. "but he cares, and that is enough. do not tell him so.")

"but you—" lunya starts in alarm before she lowers her voice in a poor, still kind of scratchy imitation of his own. " _'tis_ _the culmination, the very peak of my life's work_ pppfb—" 

"i do _not_ sound like that, you imp," raha chides as he pinches both of her cheeks into silence. "as you've so eloquently babbled, 'tis my _life's_ work. i have no intention of up and dying anytime within the next few suns, so what problem is there with tending to your every sniffled whim for a day or two?"

"ow chibalwous ofh yuw," she manages to snark, sticking her tongue out at him as he finally stops squishing her face and places the wet washcloth on her brow with a motion closer to a smack. "your bedside manner is terrible. what if i don't _want_ to be cared for?"

he shrugs, his grin lopsided and relaxed in acknowledgement. "if you refuse to let me stay here i may as well go bother reese with the same three arguments on how ethical it is to study allag. but i'm afraid it won't come down to that—since you won't let anyone else take care of you, i shan't give you a choice." 

"i'm _gross_." it's really not that she cares about her appearance around him, of all people—he's seen her drenched in ceruleum and mudpuppy blood, has carried her out of the tangle soaked in swamp water on multiple occasions, and even helped her scrub morbol pus from her hair once—but being ill is a different level of vulnerable she's uncomfortable with showing the stupid miqo'te she has a stupid stupid stupid crush on. "and you'll get sick too. i'm not a child, you don't have to take care of me."

"you are as ethereal as usual." he says it not with a trace of teasing in his tone but instead a conviction that makes it seem like he _actually means it_ , which is impossible because lunya feels like a wild boar wrapped in karakul wool and tossed in a hot spring and she's very certain that's what she looks like too. "maybe i will, and you are not and i do not _have_ to—but so long as it's you, i want to."

 _wow_ , lunya thinks, _i love you_ , and then her brain shuts down.

raha has always been good to her. _too_ good, even back when they'd just met and he'd push too far in his questions and instead of bending lunya would simply break and lash out, and he'd still apologize after she'd been cruel. _so_ good that honestly she shouldn't be all that surprised to see now that her crush on him isn't _just_ a crush anymore. it started as something small, inconsequential—adventurers follow the path of the wind and when they first met raha seemed like someone who would rather root himself to a pile of good books—but now she's doing her finest impression of a momora mora, gaping at raha as if he's plucked every star from the sky and gifted them to her, because _okay, yeah, fine!_ fine, she's a little bit in love with him!

_...seven bleeding hells._

if she were still sipping at her flask she likely would have spat all the water out, which would have led to her bursting into tears, which in turn would have probably brought reese and theo stumbling into the tent in a blind, motherly panic, so it's a good thing for both of them that the only thing that comes out of lunya's mouth is a high-pitched ' _hrm'_ of shellshocked understanding that raha doesn't really pay attention to while squinting at the labels on two nearly identical bottles of ether.

 _alright,_ she tells the little lunyas she imagines are operating her brain and the little hamster wheel in it that must surely be on fire. raha's still puzzling over tehra'ir's squashed handwriting on the back of one suspiciously coloured vial ( _ughhhhhhhh_ ), completely missing her combusting on the floor next to him, so at least her fever's good for _something_ after all. _let's think about this._ _i might be a little bit in love with raha._

_raha, whose first love is allag._

_raha, who is the only person i've talked about ul'dah to who didn't already know i was there before._

_raha, who for all his intellectual prowess, has about as much knowledge of romantic love as i do (exactly none)._

_raha, who has never so much as hinted having anything more than friendly feelings for anyone in noah._

_raha, who didn't have many friends growing up and that is the only reason why he's always been this friendly with me, and if it didn't mean anything when we first met it won't mean anything now._

_i've fixed sloppy stitches at the weavers' guild with less. i can work with this!_

actually, she can't. she can't work with it, because her headache is back and raha is looking at her again, the potions abandoned for now, and it's struck her that regretfully he's not a mannequin she can just stab away at with a needle until the problem's fixed. it's a true wonder that her temperature can climb any higher without her setting the bedroll and the tent aflame. all she can do is pray that he mistakes the new heat crawling onto her cheeks as just another symptom of her cold, or maybe because of hanabi flinging fire spells around the camp. 

before her overdriven brain can come up with more hypothetical answers to hypothetical questions of why she looks so red— _your fever, stupid!_ she reminds herself—raha's gentle smile crosses over into a grin which quickly turns into something horribly reminiscent of _devious,_ tail flicking with mischief across her side like the barbed whip of some hellish voidsent right before he ruins whatever tender mood he had unconsciously set himself.

"besides. now you're in no position to flee while i read the next chapter of _allag and adjudicators._ " 

" _noooooooo_ ," lunya groans, finally making a feeble attempt to crawl off her bedroll, but raha just places his hand firmly on her head, trapping her in place. when she starts to wail for reese to come save her she just finds herself with a mouthful of fluffy tail. _of course_ she had to be a little bit in love with the one person in camp who is just as mischievous as she is. whichever of her family's crew decided she should be nicknamed _little lady luck_ can go eat a boot.

"not so fast, you minx," raha singsongs with the practiced air of someone who's had to wrestle lalafells into staying put many times before. "by the way, you sneeze like a coeurl kitten."

"hwa _haaaaaaa!_ " comes lunya's shrill, muffled, phlegmy shriek as she thumps her fist against the side of his palm, the apoplectic sound softened by a giggle. "i don't _wanna_ hear about allagan lawmaking right now!"

raha tuts, leaning over her to shuffle around the tower of books they have set up to the side. "you could have simply said so. i'll tell you a story then—scholars believe _five_ seasons existed during the time of the allagan empire, four of them being the ones we know of today."

lunya glowers at him, more than suspicious. "and the fifth is..?"

 _smack!_ goes a regretfully familiar orange tome on the floor beside them. raha's ears wiggle with poorly contained glee.

"the season of lawmaking!" he declares as he opens _allag and adjudicators_ back to chapter five, paragraph thirty seven, line six, before lunya yanks her pillow from under her head and whallops him in the face with it with all the strength her fever-addled arms can muster.

later, after her fellow warriors do a draw to pick the next check-on-lunya-and-incur-her-wrath scapegoat, coco finds a pacified lunya cradling an empty bowl of soup with a half-dozen grudgingly drained potion vials on the tray, raha's tail curled around her as he reads his tomes in a low, soothing voice. the intricacies of allagan lawmaking are still the last thing she wants to think about while her body aches and she feels physically revolting, but when raha sets the book down and begins to sing her to sleep she starts to think that maybe she really wouldn't mind being taken care of, for once, so long as it's him.

she promptly regrets her gratitude to him and the disreputable fact that she's a little bit in love with him once it's raha's turn to come down with a cold and he spends three suns whining like the world's largest paissa brat and sneezing loud enough to wake the whole of mor dhona.

* * *

**ii. spring**

the syrcus tower climb starts off painfully slow in spite of noah's change in objective. unei warned them that the tower's inhabitants would stir to action only as fast as their ascent, so it's with no small amount of grumbling that the adventurer side of the expedition team settles into a routine of breaching only a floor each day while the researchers shove their noses further in their tomes, desperate to uncover any hint for how to seal the tower from the outside word. 

hanami, nyneve, and serella take the lead, three dots of pastel pink and dark blue at the head of the ascent. the rest—a chocolate box of fellow warriors and trusted allies—form ranks behind, weapons at the ready but otherwise chattering at ease and doling out snacks between them. it's inappropriately casual. idle commentary about why there's so many stairs floats about when they're lucky enough to make it through a floor without being attacked by reanimated ancient defenses, and even when they _are_ attacked some of the adventurers turn it into a game of who can down the most acherons. the sons of saint coinach would throw a fit over the very air of it all, but the only researcher allowed this far up the tower at this point isn't one of them and hardly cares as long as they don't break anything before he can look at it.

raha, equipped with his ability to defend himself and his necessary knowledge for identifying anything useful the tower might hold, matches his pace to lunya's own as they climb. as they do he spins together all the knowledge he's gleaned of allag through the years for their entertainment. in his element, her historian shines like a brilliant star fallen from the sky, eyes bright and tail bushed in joy as he gets to explore the object of his life's fixation. 

_it would be nice if he could always smile like this,_ lunya thinks, beaming back when he glances down at her from time to time as if to make sure she's still listening. like she would willingly stop—his passion for allag is nothing short of admirable and she's not shy to show when something enraptures her. the fallen empire is entirely a mystery to her but she loves to learn as much as raha does, so she's content to stay like this, helping to cull the tower of its less than pleasant inhabitants while he waxes poetic about how incredible this or that part of allagan technology was. 

but on the last floor they climb for the day, sati draws lunya's attention from across the room, bouncing on her heels beneath the entry of one of seven hallways splintering from the room. 

"luuuunya!" sati chirps, beckoning to her excitedly, and it's with a hint of reluctance that lunya turns away from raha. immediately, some of the other scholarly-inclined adventurers take her place in the crowd that's formed around him, and lunya tries not to think too hard about how a'dewah looks at raha as he muses on the structural integrity of the bannisters and the enchantments that prevent people from flinging themselves to the ground floor. 

_it'll only be for a few moments,_ she assures herself. he is not likely to miss her, and sati wouldn't call her if it wasn't important. 

except it soon becomes clear that what counts as 'important' is vastly different between the two of them. when she turns the corner she's met not just by the miqo'te lass but reese, hanami, zaya, and rjoli, who each give her some variation of the trademark adventurer's nod. 

"what's the matter?" lunya asks, peering past her friends to an unopened door behind them. there could be something drastic like chimeras in the next room, maybe. or perhaps zaya has lost another button on their sleeve, or the hem of rjoli's coat is fraying again, or—

"it's an experiment!" rjoli says merrily, handing her a small loaf of sweet bread—or at least, it's small in the hrothgar's hands. once in lunya's own it seems to be the size of her own head, but she tears a piece off to nibble at it anyway. she can always pull her team of lalafellin friends aside later to share it. "if you are hungry—"

"we called you because you are being _obvious_ ," hanami butts in with a click of her tongue. zaya observes the whole exchange curiously from her side, using the conversation as a chance to practice their sign language.

"hanami," reese admonishes. "don't talk over rjoli's bread."

lunya glances between her friends, completely lost. the only thing she's sure about at this point is that this bread might need more help than illya, mint, and nini to finish. "would you care to explain what it is i'm being obvious about, and how it's important enough that you just had to bring this up during work?"

sati squats down to her height, leaning close to conspiringly whisper, "y'know, 'bout _raha_ ," and lunya just about recoils right out of the tower with a splutter of horror.

"g'raha tia looks at you like you hang the moon in the night," hanami declares from above, and now lunya's certain this _has_ to be some form of revenge for making the auri warrior dress up for her own nameday. "and you have been watching him like he carries the sun across the sky. it is infuriating."

"oh, but when _zaya does it_ —" a riled, embarrassed lunya starts to exclaim, and for once reese decides to actually be helpful and wedges her hand over lunya's mouth before she can finish dragging their poor monk into this hellfire of a conversation. zaya turns an absolutely darling shade of pink beneath their facepaint, hands visibly cramping up midsign.

hanami scoffs. "they are just as bad," she says, pearly teeth exposed and gleaming as white as her scales and the facepaint that lines her eyes when she grins, the image eerily reminiscent to that of a predator which has caught its prey. "i did not think you would admit to it so easily."

"i've admitted nothing." she's known she's had feelings for raha for more than half a turn around the sun now, but being the one teased for once is so embarrassing she's almost sorry for all the times she's bothered zaya. her only consolation is they haven't explicitly pointed out that it's not a crush anymore.

rjoli chuckles, a wiggling blob of pink in the corner of her eye.

"i've heard a rumor," he tells lunya with no shortage of meddling uncle-esque glee. "a whisper on a north-westerly wind that says our little historian would like to adventure with you once the expedition is over."

 _MAJJ MISTRAL_ , lunya shrieks internally, hoping her stupid friend can sense her malevolent energy from the main room and take a spill over the side of the stairs, safety enchantments be damned. ishgard will not miss a second azure dragoon that it hasn't met yet.

"there is nothing wrong with it, [ocean jewel]." the strange, foreign words rjoli speaks to them in wash over her like a saltwater in a cove through the echo before he reaches out and pats her head, careful to not jostle the comb that holds her bunny ears in place. "don't we all deserve a little happiness?"

"you're ruining my hair, rjo," lunya sulks, but she leans upwards into his palm anyway. "what does that have to do with anything?"

" _s_ _till be together after this_ ," zaya signs slowly enough for lunya to catch each gesture. " _not s… e… p..."_

 _separated_ , rjoli signs for them, zaya copying the motion, and lunya feels a burst in pride and fondness at the sight. it'll be something to gush about to papalymo and tataru later, but for now she shuts her affection down with a frown.

"if you expect me to say something to him, do not. i'm not going to risk ruining our friendship."

"i do not think you have anything to say that _could_ ," soothes reese, kneeling down next to sati so lunya won't have to crane her neck even further to see her. stupid tall races. "i've known raha since we were in the studium, lunya. he is _different_ with—"

if lunya were to be frank, zaya and reese are both being incredibly bold to participate in this conversation when they're the two members of their little squad voted _most likely to eat their feelings_ and _wouldn't recognize flirting if lord haurchefant proposed marriage to her._

"drop it," she hisses then as a ruin starts to churn in her stomach and she swats reese's smothering, overly doting hand away. she's sick of this conversation and she's sick of the others assuming things of raha, reese's long-standing sort-of-friendship with him be _damned._ "we're done talking about this." 

the others awkwardly look away from each other, unable to really argue further. even among themselves, the warriors of light are not exactly famous for communicating when they're not in the heat of battle, and lunya's always made a point of not teasing them once past their limits. reese just sighs as she helps sati stand. 

"we may as well kill whatever's behind this door while we're here," the elezen says, and hanami makes a noise of satisfaction at the news that they can finally get knee-deep in monster guts again.

except they don't, because when they coax the door open through rjoli and lunya's magic there are no monsters or other ancient traps behind. instead, steps descend into a small garden of crystal-like flowers spanning across the circular room, butterflies with glasslike wings fluttering to and fro overhead like they hadn't been suddenly woken from a five millennia-long sleep. rjoli makes a soft noise of delight at the sight as he carefully tries to not tumble down the stairs, eo sigun finally poking their head from his mane before flitting towards the shimmering flowers with an excited burst of pixie dust. zaya's eyes gleam as they, sati, and reese squat down to examine them up close, and though it's not what she expected, hanami seems content enough with their discovery. 

before lunya can get more than five hyuran paces into the room to join them there's a low, impressed whistle from behind her, and she turns to find raha standing in the doorway, a tome tucked beneath his arm and looking nonchalant as he scans the room over her head. 

"i was wondering where everyone ran off to," he explains when he catches their quizzical stares—or lunya's, at least, for the rest of their friends are engaged in a hushed conversation among the flowers. raha remains focused on her as he strides forward, carefully stepping over the largest clusters of crystal. "i suppose there was no reason to worry without the sound of explosions."

(behind her there's a small chingling as gil exchanges hands and reese lets out a soft, triumphant hoot of _"i was right!"_

 _"by twenty seconds!"_ sati whisper-whines back. " _he has no control—"_

 _"he has too much,"_ rjoli complains jokingly. _"i was sure he would look for her sooner.")_

"no, you still should've been," lunya grumbles before she turns to hanami—or the spot hanami _was_ in. when she looks around she just barely catches the scaled tip of zaya's tail disappearing beyond the doorway, and sighs. she's going to throttle all five of them once they return to camp, twelve help her. 

raha doesn't even notice they've been left alone together with a stealth entirely surprising from all of her friends. or maybe he has and he just doesn't care. 

"curious. why would they have a garden in the tower?" he's busy musing from the center of the room, where he sits and watches the glass butterflies flit across the ceiling. it's said soft enough to be a question for himself alone, but when she comes to sit with him he hands her a stick of graphite, tapping his opened tome on the floor in front of him to indicate that he wants to hear her thoughts too. 

lunya hums contemplatively as she pulls the book onto her lap to scratch sketches of the flowers and butterflies onto a fresh page. "not everything needs a grand purpose. it's pretty."

and it is—the walls of the tower are thinner here, perhaps to let sunshine in. this late in the day, though, just dredges of the sunset filter through instead, and the flowers catch half-light through their thin petals. it feels like this garden is frozen in a time entirely separate from the rest of the tower. 

raha makes a soft noise in agreement, even though the way his brow pinches tells her he's not entirely convinced. either way, they sit quietly together for a few minutes, her shoulder pressed against his elbow and the only sounds in the room being the _skritch skritch_ of graphite on parchment; the low, nearly silent flap of gossamer wings above them; and the distant, muffled chatter from down the hall.

"i've been wondering for a while," lunya starts after a moment, smudging a dark streak over the drawn stem of an almost-jonquil. "what did you hope you'd achieve from the expedition? besides understanding your eye."

raha doesn't even hesitate, the answer coming to him like it's a speech he's recited a dozen times before. "reese thinks otherwise, and i _know_ what doga and unei said, but i believe the crystal tower emerging in this age is a gift." he leans closer to her to squint at the small collection of diagrams she's quickly assembled for him, running his thumb along the thin line of a butterfly's wing. "'tis dangerous, certainly. but so is fire, which keeps us warm, and water, which sustains us. for all the destruction the allagans caused, i cannot believe that is all they did—like this room, there must have been good along with the bad.

"if the secrets of allag—of the tower—have the means, i'd like to make a brighter future," he tells her when she turns to look right at him—and lunya fully believes he will even before she sees how his earnesty makes his face alight. "sharlayan protects the past well enough. someone needs to look forward."

"a lofty goal," she notes, but entirely kind and sincere, "but a noble one. and what of the present?"

raha grins. "that's why we have you, is it not?"

oh, wonderful. he's being earnest, which is bad enough for her heart even before he turns that one thousand lightning crystal grin at her. she cannot help the way her eyes scrunch with a soft crescent of a smile when a laugh bubbles from her chest, propelling her to shove at his arm to hide how affection leaves its mark as a colour in her cheeks. "be serious! you're really leaving this up to some adventurer?"

"you're not just _some_ adventurer," raha reminds her as he stands, accepting his book back when she offers it. "at least, you're not to me."

"very well, lord raha," lunya concedes, giving him her hand to help her up, his hand entirely ensconcing hers. "if you should protect the future, i will be the blade at your side that cuts a way through the present."

carefully, he reaches out to tuck her hair behind her ear, and she watches, enchanted, as a butterfly gently settles on his shoulder. the crystals refract twilight across his face, and not for the first time she wishes it were easier to be at eye level with him, to see how the splintered light shines. "i am counting on you, lady lanya."

 _twelve_ , she's weak for him. but she so wholeheartedly trusts in him, so fervently believes he will make the future he wants to see. he makes lunya want to live up to her mantle— _bringer of light_ , _warrior of light_. if he truly thinks she's worthy of carrying the torch towards his future she wants to prove him right. because...

she loves him. she really, truly does. it's not a _little bit_ at this point. and… it hasn't been that way in quite a while, hasn't it? the revelation isn't distressing like it had been the first time. standing here with him, in the twilight of the ancients and an eternal garden, realizing not for the first time that she loves him simply feels like the homecoming of spring to aldenard, of frost giving way to flowers and birdsong and the rising wind eternal, like it's all part of the natural order of the universe.

raha presses his thumb into the dip in her cheek from her smile and—

"l-lunya?" comes a shy call from the door, and lunya takes a step away from raha and her ridiculous feelings and the realization that _hey, wait a minute, what am i doing? raha doesn't feel that way, idiot!_ to cross the room to illya, who looks rather mortified for someone who probably hasn't realized exactly what she's interrupted. the taller lalafell makes a small noise of surprise as lunya all but drags her down the steps to where she and raha were most certainly _not_ having a tender moment. chatter spills from lunya's lips in what hopefully looks more like excitement than her shot nerves. 

"illya, look how _darling_ this room is." 

"i-it's lovely, truly," illya stammers, looking nervously over at raha. when lunya glances back toward him, he seems strangely sulky but still paying attention. "but lunya, i was told to call you and g'raha tia back to… to end the e-expe… expebp… to go back down the tower for the day." 

"very well," comes raha's grumble before he stretches, rolling a knot from his shoulders that has lunya fussing over non-existent dirt on illya's pristine white robes, desperately trying to not think about his bare shoulders and how his muscles flare as he moves his arms. 

illya catches lunya's eye in the midst of it, mouth forming a small _oh_ that she thankfully doesn't vocalize when she sees lunya's flushed face. lunya silently thanks the twelve that illya is not the kind of person who teases, unlike herself, and not for the first time she wonders if she should be putting more effort into being a gentle person like her younger friend. 

...it'd probably be a futile effort.

when they reemerge into the main room it takes a while for the others to notice to return. coco and hanabi are the first, waving at lunya from where they're helping scrawl down allagan runes from a pillar while reese determinedly shovels bread rolls in her mouth, looking anywhere but in her direction. the rest of her interrogation team is wisely scattered about—rjoli and sati have gotten swept up in what looks like their own miniature dance-off with illya's group of friends, and the girl in question quickly shuffles off to watch. across the room zaya and hanami amicably sit in silence, watching the bustle of the others running about. 

"i believe this is enough for the day," raha announces behind her to a mixture of cheers and groans at the thought of going back down all those steps. "do remember to check in with a member of the sons when we make it back to the find."

as the others begin to shuffle around to pick up waylaid weapons and chicken-scratched notes and an allagan construct's head that gets several people hollering _PUT THAT DOWN, ELWIN!_ and _LUMELLE, DON'T HELP HIM!!!_ raha turns to lunya with a smile. 

"shall we, madam?" he sweeps into a mocking bow, waving a hand toward the stairs. "we have a dinner reservation at mor dhona's finest restaurant—st. coinach's rustiest soup pot." 

"don't let rowena hear you say that unless you wish to lose your tail," lunya mutters, though she doesn't bother to hide her snicker. before she can move towards him, raha leaps down three steps, looking over his shoulder at her with boundless mischief in his eyes. 

"make haste, adventurer! this is to be a _race!"_ he calls to her with a massive shite-eating grin, and then he breaks into a sprint down the stairs, the arrows in their quiver bouncing at his back as he dashes down what'll be a half-dozen set of floors like a fool. the real one must be lunya, though, as she freezes in his chaotic wake and her heart does a little tapdance at the very words he used during their first meeting. when she finally snaps out of it a second later he's already halfway to the next set of stairs, and her competitive spirit lights a fire beneath her heels as she dashes to the railing. behind her there's a scuffle as some of their more energetic adventurers scramble to catch up, haphazardly carrying crates and tomes and swords as they rush to join the impromptu little race back to the find. 

"when you slip and split your head on the steps i won't heal you!" lunya yells after him as she pulls herself up on the bannister, laughter rising from somewhere below. raha _did_ say the rails were enchanted to prevent falling over the side, after all, and if she were to fly _forward_ he would most certainly catch her. 

as they begin yet another game of chase, it feels like flowers are blossoming in her heart, a trail of petals furling behind her as she's engulfed in her ever-growing love for him.

* * *

**iii. summer**

the fourth umbral moon sweeps in vylbrand's last dredges of heat and alights all of la noscea with a cacophony of sound and colour as the final weeks of summer beckons moonfire faire in. costa del sol is bedecked in bombard lanterns and booths and carnival games, and when word makes its way to the find of the festivities there comes an agreement—with only _some_ protest by rammbroes—to take a break from the expedition for the week. 

eastern la noscea is close to home; almost _too_ close. but when lunya searches within for the fear of seeing her family here she finds none. instead, as she watches raha steadily weave through the crowd of festival-goers ahead of her, his tail sways in a gentle rhythm compared to the unsteady tremble of her heart.

she's been alone with him plenty of times before, and it's not as if they're even truly alone today—the rest of the expedition team is scattered around the resort, and she knows some of the scions must be around too if the sight of hanami and zaya flinging thancred into the sea was any indication. but the difference this time is that nyneve cheerily told her that this counted as a _date_ while she spritzed a flowery perfume on lunya's wrist, and then teleported out of the rising stones before any protests could be made. it's a ridiculous thought to overthink like lunya has: you have to _ask_ someone on a date, and you need to have romantic interest in them. raha didn't. _doesn't_. but that doesn't stop the blush that creeps deeper up the back of her neck and flushes across her cheeks and ears when she tries to look directly at him. 

she _knows_ she's being stupid. her nameday had been the moon before, yet she's still acting like she's… well, she doesn't quite know what age this behavior would be expected at, but she remembers some of the older girls from the arcanists' guild turning into idiots on the rare occasions guildmaster k'rhid showed his smarmy face around mealvaan's gate. gods, she's turned into one of them, hasn't she?

when she looks up, thinking of her old guildmaster and the secrets behind his fluffy hair and how he's definitely not as handsome as raha is, it's to a distinct lack of any red in front of her.

"raha?" his name falls from her unbidden as she looks for any sign of her wayward companion, finding nothing but a haze of unfamiliar faces. she doesn't want to say she's afraid of crowds—it's not that simple—but to lose sight of raha so suddenly is unnerving, especially when everywhere she looks she's met with more and more legs. 

_he couldn't have gotten far,_ lunya reasons, backing up as far as she can out of the crowd until her back hits a bench that she can hop on top of, away from the heavy footfall of the passerby that could easily turn into a stampede. she'll be fine. her friends are just a linkpearl away, and raha will have an easier time looking for her than she'll have looking for him. all she has to do is stay put and—

"are you alone, miss?"

the lalafellin man who grabs her shoulder doesn't remove his hand when she turns around even when she's visibly tense and ready to strike. he actually steps _closer_ , which makes her think he might not know who she is. or maybe he does, and he has a death wish. he seems like just another festival attendee and harmless enough besides his blatant disregard for her personal space, but lunya's not eager to fight off unwanted advances today, and _especially_ not while she's on the verge of getting back a bad memory. 

she puts on her shiniest, fakest ul'dahn smile—the one she picked up from dealing with men bragging about their wealth to someone who could hardly care less at the ossuary—and takes a step back. the man is visibly dismayed by the lack of positive reaction, but he's not put off enough to just leave her be already. 

"perhaps i could steal you for a drink at the flying shark?"

"actually," lunya hears herself say while she thinks about whether or not a bio spell would be too noticeable, "i'm waiting for some friends, so if you would please excuse me—"

"oh, i understand!" the stranger laughs. why won't he _let go?_ "but i would feel terrible if i left such a lovely woman on her own in a crowd, you see."

 _it would be terrible for the warrior of light to strike a civilian,_ she reminds herself, still wearing a patient smile. _absolutely terrible._ "i assure you i will be alright, good sir."

"oh, goodness, no," the man exclaims, aghast. "i'll keep you company until they arrive, if you don't mind."

 _i do mind_ , _actually_ , lunya wants to say along with no less than a dozen casual insults over his choice in dye colours—the _nerve_ of this man approaching her wearing halatali yellow and salmon pink in tandem, he looks like a _ham sandwich_ —but what comes out instead is a squeak as her gravity tips and she falls into the unexpected chest against her back, bare arms coming to twine around her middle.

" _there_ you are," raha breathes against her ear, and it's like the descent of summer on the valleys of vylbrand, a theoretical sun casting its warmth into every nook and cranny in her body. "i've been looking all over for you."

the stranger splutters. when lunya dares to to the side up, her dear friend and savior is gazing at the lalafellin man with both disinterest and a strange smugness. his tail is wound around her knee, the tip tapping gently against the back like a hot poker.

"my apologies," the stranger says, looking far more irritated than sorry as he bows to them both. "i didn't realize the warrior of light already had a beau."

the words make lunya's face even warmer, and she can only stare blankly as the other lalafell stomps away from them and disappears in the crowd. behind her, raha makes a small _hmph_ of irritation.

"a _beau_ —" she twists in his arms as well as she can, hoping the dying light hides what feels an awful lot like an embarrassed blush on her face. raha's ears are laid flat against his head, but when he catches her looking up at him they begin to perk up a bit. "my, sir raha, i wasn't aware you had any intention in courting me."

"alas, he spoiled it," raha fake-groans, dropping his head onto her shoulder. "i meant to ask you over dinner first and then take you on a whirlwind date through northern thanalan, whence we could take turns taking potshots at the garleans by the castrum with a slingshot."

"how romantic," lunya coos. however joking and silly, the exchange on top of his proximity makes her shudder, but he must take it as her being cold for he wraps himself around her even more. she strides through it as best as she can, patting his head before stepping away. "how long were you listening?"

when raha huffs she bites down a smile. "long enough to know he needed to leave. there are few people worthy of my attention when i am on vacation, but there are even fewer worthy of _yours_."

"i am a warrior of light," she reminds him, finally caving to the grin that forms when a laugh peels from her. the corners of his eyes wrinkle at the sound, though a pout remains firmly on his face. "i'm not certain we _get_ proper vacations."

"you are a warrior, yes. not an _indentured servant_ ," her sweet, hopelessly _stubborn_ boy insists, looking up at her through those stupidly long lashes of his. the breeze shifts his hair past his crimson eye, and as ever she's struck by just how lovely the colour is. "you need not spend your effort on anyone or anything unless you _want_ to."

when she looks for a way to respond—something to tell him other than a pathetic ' _no one's told me that before'_ or a _'so, you?'_ —her thoughts are washed away by raucous cheers as fireworks begin to splinter across costa del sol's sky. the movement of raha turning to look distracts her— 

it is not her first time seeing fireworks and it won't be her last, but this is the first time they've failed to dazzle her, when the face of the man who may very well be her _best_ friend is painted a kaleidoscope of colour by their vibrance. white reflects like moonlight off his crimson hair, the shadows of his bangs dusted ochre and cinnamon as they sweep across his brow. the green of vylbrand's rolling fields dapple down to the tip of his nose, and the rhotano's blue and thanalan's bronze twilights seem to roll across his jawline, seeping violet in the turn of his lips. rose blooms in the dip in his cheek, in that little pocket that rises whenever he smiles as she leans in and tells him the secrets she's told no other. gold freckles his lashes and when he blinks it's like seeing the sunrise for the first time again, rays of light breaking over the teal sea and the sky set aglow with vermillion. 

_oh._

twenty summers and half the realm traced in the soles of her boots and lunya doesn't think she's ever seen anything quite like this. she's never once been short on affection for raha, but… looking at him like this, caressed by the warm breeze of the merlthor and under the curtain of a million stars, his gentle and affectionate words sinking into her chest and tasting of la noscean oranges and seasalt, the very image of him resonating so close to the feeling of home it makes her _ache_ , she sees just how _hard_ she's really fallen.

and the image of home reminds her that she can't have him.

"lunya?" raha's stopped watching the fireworks, but they continue to shed their colours on his concerned expression and it sends a pounding noise ringing through her ears. "is everything alright, my friend?" 

"peachy," lunya answers in nearly a whisper, wishing a hole would open up beneath her and warp her far, far away from here and her traitorous heart. 

she's not alright. raha is too good, to her and _for_ her. he deserves more than a hypocrite who speaks in half-truths and can't even begin to make up for all the time she's spent hurting others. even if he did have feelings for her in turn—and he _doesn't_ , no matter what reese says, and she forces that into her heart as the truth because what good will it do otherwise?—all she knows how to do is _hurt_. they call her a healer, but it's a stretch: her physicks burn and her adloquiums boil and she knows her friends have taught themselves to hide how much she hurts them when she so desperately wants to fix them. her blood is drenched with poison and hellfire and the end of times, and her magic will _never_ sing of the return of spring like theo's or a summer lit with fireflies like a'dewah's.

the twelve dictated long ago that she cannot know lasting happiness, but this is a flavour of heartbreak she is so unused to the taste of. 

and lunya, the warrior of light, the champion of eorzea, ever the martyr, says, "i was just thinking." she crushes her own heart in her fist and swallows it, donning her brightest, sunniest smile; one of the kinds she realizes she's been keeping just for him for a while now. she leaves the ends of what that statement could be to rest in the wind, where maybe someday she'll pull them in and unwrap the words for him and him alone. "maybe i'll tell you about it later."

(she won't.) 

"...i'll hold you to it," raha says casually, though they both know he will not and her assurances aren't enough to settle the worry in his brow. the fireworks have finally sizzled into nothingness but it's the last thing on lunya's mind. "you know, i saw a booth some ways back with candied oranges. i failed to obtain any before i needed to away and save a princess, but i do remember where it was."

"oh, you," lunya playfully swoons, the inside of her mouth tasting of bile and a cloyingly fake sweetness, a bitterness she has felt so many times before. 

not for the first time, she dons her mask. in a final betrayal to her home, she becomes an actress once more and all the world is her stage. ul'dah was too small to blot out her light and now she must fool the audience of her final performance: her heart.

she presses the back of her palm to her forehead before she steps back toward his now outstretched arm, allowing him the rare honor of scooping her up to set her upon his shoulders. "you truly know the way to a woman's heart, sir raha."

his knees make a small crack as he stands, heaving a relieved sigh as he's finally freed from the squat he put himself in. he jibes, "you know the saying: sweets for the sweet. would you be willing to share some with your most loyal knight, your highness?"

"absolutely not." she presses her cheek into the crown of his head, the tip of her pointed ear following the curve of his, and prays the rush of the crowd won't betray how hard her heart is pounding as they weave around a sea of giggling hyuran girls and a roegadyn woman showing off for them. "but i'll buy you a miqo'bob."

his ear flicks against her face and she squeaks, raha shaking with laughter when she does. 

"with tuna," he adds unnecessarily through silent giggles, as if she doesn't already know. "i'll be paying for your candy in turn, of course."

lunya grabs his ears and tugs until raha whines a soft _nooo!_ "g'raha tia, you will let me pay for my own snacks or _so help me_ i will kill you." 

"come now, you love me too much to even fathom the thought," raha ribs as he squeezes her ankle in return, and lunya makes a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sigh as she silently cedes.

if only he knew.

"besides, what can you do from up there? bite my ears off? _OW_ — lunya! it was a _joke!"_

* * *

**iv. fall**

after losing three of their companions at the top of the crystal tower, it seems only right for the last days of autumn to usher frost into mor dhona.

the sons and the ironworks labour tirelessly to find the key into the world of darkness, employing every tool and tome at their disposal to unlock one of the tower's greatest secrets. the scholarly members of the adventurer team stick around to help—but not lunya. a lover of learning and a talented arcanist she may be but a _true_ scholar she is not, and doga and unei's lives are not something she is willing to gamble her uneducated cents on.

(it's _not_ because she is a coward and a fool in equal measures. she is avoiding no one—)

but the bells stretch dangerously on into days, and there is only so much for adventurers to do locally when half of the area is off-limits to anyone who is afraid of frogs. lunya makes do with her weaving work and cleaning around the rising stones, doing her best to not look at the distant spire of the crystal tower rising to the east when she crosses the toll to make her deliveries to the house of splendors, and when new adventurers sweep in bearing flashes of crimson, she throws herself into the repetitive motions of snipping and sewing and sweeping and shining even harder than before.

it's between bouts of sparring with h'lios and majj (though it's more like _play-fighting_ with the latter) as a little show for the refugee doman children that she finds a letter in her hands smelling of tea and lilacs, delivered not by a moogle but a sprightly miqo'te with rose-taupe hair and a sunny smile who assured her miss gyokuro yamashiro was a friend of his and she was not expecting a written reply. 

the letter… is frustrating to say the least.

but that's how lunya winds up back in the find with the rest of the adventurer team, pots of beef stew and other foods carefully arranged on the backs of several chocobos, still feeling like she shouldn't be there but knowing there is only so long she can delay the inevitable. 

their mounts announce their arrival before they can, ube's cheery _kweh!_ drawing the eyes of the swarm of sons rushing back and forth across the camp up the hill. when the first of them realizes the adventurer team has come bearing lunch and chaos breaks out, lunya sees none of it, looking past the relieved flood of orange for any sign of crimson hair. 

raha is normally the first to greet her when she arrives, but there's no trace of him out by the supply crates or on the scaffolds. maybe he just doesn't want to see her, which is a stupid thing to feel terrible about because _she_ hadn't wanted to see him either. while thinking too hard over it she doesn't notice the large hand hovering beside her until einar clamps down on her shoulder. 

"yeyema," her brother says just loud enough for her alone to hear, and lunya nearly falls off ube in surprise. he smiles apologetically at her as she jostles in her chocobo's saddle to glare at him. "go look for him."

"who do you mean?" lunya asks, drawing the tension that catches in her voice as thin as possible. is she so obvious that even einar—who wouldn't know what to do if someone pretty told him they wanted to hold his hand—can see how she feels? 

einar pulls her off her chocobo, and for a moment lunya feels like she is barely thirteen summers again and he didn't have that strange tattoo on his back before he went and disappeared on carteneau and she forgot his name and face for half a decade. 

"g'raha tia is a good man," he says, and as she looks upon his one golden eye she wonders what he sees when he looks at her now, a distant echo of the girl he met on pearl lane all those years ago. her reflection in his eyes looks like an idiot with these bunny ears. "his affection for allag does not stop him from looking after others—he cares deeply, and for you especially."

"i don't need your approval." she frowns, chin raised in defiance even as her shoulders sink in defeat once he's set her on the ground. "and i think you assume too much from him, especially now."

"but you wanted it," einar rightfully guesses with a chuckle, and she looks down, bangs falling before her eyes. he pats her head. "do not be scared of the answers to your questions, little moon. you've grown more than you know. he does not hate you."

the bud of hope that blooms in her chest at his assurances is small. _meaningless_ , she wants to say, but she doesn't because einar is not someone who says things he doesn't fully believe. and she _wants_ to believe him—believe that she hasn't damaged her friendship with raha irreversibly.

"i'm not usually wont to taking advice from the man who mistook a jar of bombard cores for pineapple buns," lunya cedes with a wry smile, einar turning pink at the years-old memory. "but if you _insist_."

her brother beams even as he scratches the back of his ear in embarrassment, and she leaves him there with ube's reins to break free of the flood of hungry researchers and adventurers. she traces a path through the camp, past the lines of red canvas tents and down to the shore, not bothering to stop by their shared tent.

raha is right where she expects him to be, skipping pebbles across silvertear lake's surface. it's a strange reversal of the way he normally finds her here, practicing her dancing in solace, and without her orchestrion it's uncomfortably quiet besides the gentle hush of the waves lapping against the shoreline and crinkle of crystallized foliage beneath her boots as she approaches. his ears swivel toward her as she does, though he does not look back. 

"found you," she says softly to break the silence, just loud enough for him to hear. 

"lunya," raha greets, and she is so familiar with the faultlines of his heart that she can hear the strain in his voice before he even looks to her and it becomes all too clear that he's exhausted, dark moons pooled beneath his eyes and a weary line drawn across his brow. he is used to burning candles down to stems for research, but he'd been better about it since they first breached the tower doors at the beginning of spring.

it's her fault that he's like this now.

she thinks about the letter that made her come down here early, of gyo's plea for her to come back and _talk_ to raha about the day they lost doga and unei, to set aside the angry words that had fallen from both of them in the aftermath—not that lunya was proud of her childishness or how quickly she had turned to impulse and hurtful jabs again. the memory of their fight tastes like a nightmare at the back of her throat, burning dark like bile in her mouth.

_the battle was a disaster, more than half of their little alliance of adventurers falling victim to the echo and a vision of an age long past. anyone left standing had a half dozen enemies to deal with each, and lunya herself recovered right on time for one of doga's doubles to hurl a fireball at her while sati was busy pulling her rapier out of an almost-unei._

_before the inferno could fully dislodge itself from its focus, raha was there, piercing a barrage of arrows through the false doga and any other clone that dared to cross his line of vision. when another rose up from behind him to smash her stave against his head, lunya could only react on impulse, lunging forward and shoving her friend down by the knees as an adloquium pooled beneath her open palm. her eyes compounded for but a moment, a million butterfly scales fluttering forth to protect raha first before herself, until her shield faltered and shattered against her hand and sharp allagan metal sliced her palm open._

_the gasp of pain she let out was drowned out with a sizzle as the air around her began to boil until it burst, an instinctive flare of her own solar fire incinerating the not-quite unei and sending herself ricocheting across the room. her next memory of the fight was of theo's ishgardian curses as he frantically pressed a cure into her head, the corpses of unei and doga's copies littered across the throne room and the rest of the expedition team in a complete disarray._

_raha was there too, brow knit with something more than worry as lunya brushed theo's mothering hand away. sure, her head hurt, and maybe her hand was still bleeding, but from where she was crumpled on the ground she could see there were others worse off than herself. against raha and theo's joint protests she pushed herself up, shaking off the worst of the lingering pain of getting flung across the room by her own explosion to limp over to ninira._

_"lunya, stop," raha repeated as he followed after her. tension made his shoulders as stiff and long as the horizon, his tail lashing in frustration as he hovered over her shoulder. she hadn't responded at first, murmuring a tense apology to ninira as she singed a physick against her sister-mage's burnt arm and ignored the pain of her own hands beneath her bandages. at the time, what raha had to say hardly seemed important next to tending to the injuries of their friends._

_"lunya," raha said louder. "you need to stop expending your mana."_

_the huff that left her was heavier and more heated than the worst of vylbrand's summer typhoons as she turned from ninira, who quickly stood and scuttled away. agitation rolled off raha in waves as she hissed, the harshness of her voice grating to her own ears, "if you're not bleeding then stay out of the way."_

_"not bleeding, she says!" raha scoffed as he stomped his boot on the floor, the laces keeping the leather bound around his calf dislodging as he did. "have you even looked at yourself?"_

_…she hadn't, honestly, but she could already imagine the scorched ends of her hair and the exhaustion across her face, or how her hands glowed and bled in tandem as her aether twisted in protest over its strain._

_"_ — _no reason for you to take that strike for me," raha said, and something inside of lunya began to boil._

_"'haps if you'd pull that gigantic 'ead of yours out of your arse," lunya breathed, low and venomous, "you would not have been at risk to be hit."_

_"i am not so arrogant to act like i do not need help." for the first time, she found that the colour of raha's eyes angered her as he glared down at her, the sanguine hue looking more like a shard of dalamud than a comforting summer sky. "and i am not so foolish as to throw myself in the face of every possible danger."_

_there was a soft, worried murmur somewhere over her shoulder. it might have been rjoli, or maybe it was theo, but in the moment it didn't matter as lunya finally snapped, eyes aglow with the dark dusk of a la noscean storm._

_"'tis a right shame, truly," she said bitterly, "that you clearly don't know when you aren't wanted."_

_immediately, she knew that she had gone too far, had pressed viciously on the one bruise she thought she knew better than to. she could have apologized then and there. their promise of traveling the lands, crossing the sea, taking to the skies upon the eternal wind together—it could still be hers. except…_

_raha was right_ . _she was arrogant, a fool. one too stubborn to let sleeping dogs lie. when he froze, hurt and betrayal writ clear on his face, her pride would not let her give in to the guilt or regret that overwhelmed her in the wake of her unwarranted violence._

_so she chose to leave that wound as it was. the silence between them shattered as she turned on her heel with the sound of a blistering homeward gale and the scent of brine, breaking into motes of aetherlight as her return spell bled from her still-open wounds and spirited her away from the tower and the surely broken pieces of what was her most precious friendship._

_it seemed more obvious than ever that everything she did ended up hurting the ones she wanted to protect._

she's an idiot.

how many nights in the bath had she spent scrubbing angrily at her skin until she had turned pink? the anger she's carried for a decade, _half her life,_ still festers beneath, still boils—a deep-rooted hatred for those who had set the floorboards of her childhood aflame, at the injustice that filled every crack and splinter of ul'dah's streets and her people, at susuna for her abuse and manipulation, at kichirou and einar for abandoning her, at her own helplessness in the face of all of that and more. she could pull the stems of the weeds again and again, but its roots still remain and it's always just a matter of time before she returns to the monster susuna taught her to be.

she is not a good person, not someone worthy of even _standing_ in the radiance of someone as kind and bright as raha, whose future glows with a million stars. unlike herself, raha is not cruel, having bore injustice on his shoulders before he even knew what the word meant. if she steps over the threshold of 'just friends' she may drown him with her. 

but—

 _'he looks lost without you,'_ gyo had written, each letter looped across a sheet of parchment with a sense of carefreeness that made it clear she hadn't hesitated in writing them. ' _no one wants to see the two of you hurt, sweetling_.'

"i hadn't thought—" raha's hesitating. he is normally so much more verbose than this, but whose fault is that if not hers? "for what it is worth, i'm—"

"do not apologize," lunya warns him, her nails digging crescents in her palms. she doesn't deserve any semblance of an apology after what she's done, not when she's yet to beg for forgiveness herself. "not until i do."

his shoulders fall, burdened with tiredness and her own trademark stubbornness, and she swallows her nerves when he looks at her in resignment, giving her a silent go-ahead. 

now or never then.

"i'm sorry. i can't take back what i said but i _never_ should have said it, you didn't deserve to hear that at all and i can't apologize enough for just stepping on your trust like that. i'm sorry i had to pick a fight at the worst possible time for _everyone_ , and you are allowed to hate me for it and you can yell if that'd make you feel better, i—"

"i'm _not_ angry at you," raha cuts in, pinching the bridge of his nose.

_...what?_

maybe she's just… imagining it. naturally, since she's some kind of glutton for punishment, she hesitantly says, "you have full right to be," just in case he changes his mind.

"i do," raha agrees, sundown gaze piercing her like a straight shot. "but i'm not."

lunya blinks. once. twice. she fights the urge to pinch her arm or rub at her eyes to make sure she's actually awake or in the proper realm of existence.

"i forgive you," raha says without a hint of hesitation and it makes her want to smack her fist against his shoulder. he's more of a warrior of light than she is, with his unconditional love for the world he hasn't seen in its entirety and all of the people in it. he's going to make a fine adventurer once this is over. "i know. i understand the desire to protect. but lunya—you don't have to take care of me."

he's starting to ramble now like an overturned barrel at the lakeside. it's not pretty and it's not fluid, but it doesn't matter because her apology wasn't either and now she finds herself interrupting him.

"so long as it's you, i want to," she assures him, impulse and the encouraging words of her loved ones and all the times he's repeated old conversations of theirs that made her heart skip a beat driving her forward. "you always tell me to be more selfish—why are those words meant for me alone? what about you?" 

"i—we can ill afford to lose you, lunya. eorzea cannot go on without you. the _warriors_ cannot." he's shaking his head at her, so fervent in his belief but so _wrong_. the warriors stand united. their ranks will not break if even one of them should fall. they may mourn and they may grieve, but they will carry on for those they have lost, for those they can yet save. 

she just doesn't want raha to be another name on that list.

"and i cannot afford to lose _you_ , stupid. you must not have noticed, but you've become essential to me." she may as well just cut out her heart and sew it into the sleeves of her robes at this point as she continues, still incensed, "so no, i won't _not_ take care of you. you've always done the same for me. you _brat._ "

raha crosses his arms, fingers digging into the sides of his doublet as he exhales deeply through his nose. he's not angry. he really isn't. she can tell now that she's not muddled by fear of losing him, but she still digs uneasily at her wrists through her halfgloves as she waits for him to piece together his next thoughts.

"you asked me what i meant to learn from the tower and i spoke only the truth." the words do not flow from him so much as they are hashed out, rough and tired, the tautness of his shoulders and the fold of his sanguine eye forming a horizon line from where the sun refuses to sink and instead sears a hole straight through her heart. "i want to make a brighter future—but it is not that simple anymore, lunya."

he kneels before her then, taking her hand in his as he has a hundred times before and like it is only the most natural state of the universe. lunya stares dizzily at him, unable to even blink.

"i want to see you in that future." his fingers trail along the back of her palm, the sensation white-hot as he traces the dazzling tails of falling stars into her skin. "tomorrow, the day after, next week, next year, always. you are not just the heroine of a story to be recorded for the generations—you are beyond dear, _beyond essential_ to me, and there is naught i wouldn't suffer to keep you safe."

under the weight of his affection, lunya all but crumbles, the fight draining from her as she looks at his flattened ears and the earnest light in his eyes. she raises her other hand to smother the tears that dew in her eyelashes, though she is unable to catch the way a sob forces its way from her throat. her heart is one messily stitched together, torn apart by broken promises and desperately held together still by the wishes of the realm. but as it stands now, as _she_ stands in the reminder that there are people who still care about her for more than her titles, people who want to stay with her as she learns how to heal, lunya thinks she wouldn't quite mind if love is what rips this heart of hers apart at the seams and if love is what will sew it back together again.

"...you need to take a break," she tells him without looking, the words watery as she grips his hand in her own as hard as she dares. his palm is thrice larger than her own but the way they connect still feels natural. "come on, we brought lunch."

but before she can turn and drag him back towards camp, raha crushes her into an embrace, one that threatens to make her heart explode and kill them both on the spot. he's in a good mood again, at least, so she lets him have this (and if she's to be honest, she lets herself have it too). 

"lunya," he says against her ear before he pulls back, and though her mind says to look away, her heart, as ever, follows the sound of his voice and her name on his tongue, whispered like it is something sacred and not just a word she plucked from the broken pieces of her grieving heart as a child. when she looks him in the eye again, she's floored by way tenderness smooths his brow, a rare vulnerability in the nervous quirk of his lip once he's sure he has her attention. "you won't forget any of that, right?" 

without waiting for her to even start thinking of a response, he picks her up and saddles her on his shoulders, making a dash back to the camp with a triumphant cheer of _"syhrwyda's steeeeeeew!"_ lunya laughing in surprise above him, all their grievances forgiven in that final happy motion.

when they crest over the hill to their tent, it's to the sight of three of lunya's friends coming from the other direction. laurelis breaks into a huge smile when she sees them, shaking kirishimi's stew-bearing arm with her free hand as she cradles a stack of cutlery and plates. illya _beams_ when she sees lunya and raha together again, and there's hardly a trace of shyness on her face when she eagerly hands a small bundle of bread to raha before the trio run off to deliver more food.

"shall we then?" raha asks as he lets her leap down to hold open the tent flap for him so they can eat within. lunya rolls her eyes as he mockingly bows to her before they settle down for lunch. 

and everything's back to normal. raha babbles away about the current developments with the scholar side of the expedition and their attempts to force open the world of darkness to currently no avail. lunya listens intently as she chews at her stew, shoving her carrots around her bowl until they're not visibly carrots anymore and therefore not unappealing to eat. the jokes and sass flow easily between them like they had never stopped, and for a moment lunya can forget that the end of the world via a resurrected ancient civilization of hubris and boundless greed is imminent. 

except somewhere after her third slice of garlic bread something changes.

raha's looking at her weirdly now. if she has stew on her face and he hasn't told her yet she's going to end him, honestly, but even when she wipes at her mouth with her sleeve he doesn't budge.

"do you need more salt?" she dares to ask, praying syhrwyda and theo won't come crashing through their tent in insult. 

raha takes a breath. no, that's not even it—he's caught halfway through what he already has, the air in his lungs stuttering as a burst of words so quick and so frantic breaks through before he can properly breathe, fast enough that she almost doesn't catch it, and if she hadn't she never would have forgiven herself for losing something so utterly precious.

 _"i think i'm in love with you,"_ is what he says, and it's like the sun collapses on lunya's heart, mor dhona's crystalline hills breaking to give way to spring once again, the early frost melting into a warm rain and returning life to silvertear lake. the birdcage that encases her falls to the floor under the weight of his words, glass shattering to free doves that alight in the rushing wind, ushering a spark into every pore of her being, and lunya, the epitome of elegance and ever one step ahead as she leads the pack, drops her spoon and splatters broth on the front of her robe as her brain tries to catch up with the fact that he loves her too? he loves her? he _loves_ her? and _gods, the others will never let me live this down._ she wishes she could capture this moment forever—raha's face glowing red, the tip of his tail fizzled, mouth gaping like a beached fish, all indicators that this wasn't what he meant to say at all and by the _twelve_ she is so grateful anyway.

 _you idiot_ , lunya wants to weep, to seize him by the collar of his doublet and shake him senseless though she can do little more than gape helplessly in the moment. _you awful, sweet, wonderful idiot. you are a scholar, think before you speak!_

for one fleeting moment she thinks of everything that's stopped her until now. of her bloodied hands and the monster that wears her skin. but then she thinks of raha's smile, of every way he's loved her, of every way her friends and family (and raha has become _both_ ) have loved her through all her imperfections. and she's always been a risktaker. this dance of theirs—their endless chases across the lake shore made manifest in their hearts—has gone on for long enough, hasn't it? 

her mouth is so painfully dry again, but she hardly needs a waterskin when the words have been threatening to fall from her lips for so many phases of the moon and she finally has the courage to set them free.

here's so much she wants to tell him—that he's her best friend; that it feels like she's known him forever; that he makes her want to heal, to let go of her anger and relearn love and kindness, like what he's given her in abundance without asking for aught in turn; that she loves him, she loves him, _she loves him too oh gods does she love him with every ounce of stardust within her._

"raha, i—"

but there's a clamour from outside, one which culminates in the tent flap swinging open and allowing the flood of sound from the whole camp astir in. lunya finds herself leapt away from raha and her stew, face turned to the side so their unexpected visitor cannot see just how flustered she is.

"seven hells!" she hears raha snarl as he leaps to his feet, knocking his own stew across the tent floor. " _rammbroes_ —!"

"we've found it," rammbroes interrupts between wheezing gasps, hunched over and struggling to catch his breath. he must have run all the way from the tower to deliver whatever the news is himself. "a way into the world of darkness."

she does not catch raha glancing towards her, lip bitten in frustration and want and embarrassment, his brow weighed heavily by their responsibilities, before he grabs his bow and quiver from their place in the corner of the tent and follows the expedition leader without another question. the moment is gone, just like that. raha is not _her raha_ but g'raha tia, representative of the students of baldesion and authority on allagan history, and lunya is not some lovestruck, besotted fool of a girl but the warrior of light and champion of eorzea, and their job is to save their colleagues—their friends—from another world. 

in the short, fleeting heartbeats after he leaves, taking the breath from her with him, lunya slumps onto his bedroll. the scent of vanilla and mint still lingers in his wake and the floor, still covered in stew, seems infinitely wider without her own sleeping bag by his, and before she can stop herself from truly going off the deep end she wrangles his pillow into her arms and stifles a shriek into it as she kicks his blanket somewhere into the corner of the tent, more aware than ever that she's utterly hopeless. _why_ did her heart beat _harder_ when it wasn't even a romantic confession? the floor of their tent in the middle of mor dhona, _really?!_ not even a full bell after their messy apology? by all accounts, she should throttle raha for it, or at the very least soak rammbroes' favourite boots in bog water and the stew on the rug.

it takes her another twenty seconds to summon the strength to step out of their tent, and as she does she squares her shoulders beneath the midday sun before falling in line with hanabi and coco as they catch the back of the crowd rushing towards the tower. there are things she needs to do first—doga and unei are waiting for them (and nero as well, she supposes). there's time for the… the _confession_ and their _feelings_ and the consequences of it all later, when it is just her and raha able to speak in private once more.

but there isn't, and they don't, and the "romance of a lifetime" nyneve loved to croon about ends before it could even begin, and the parts of her that have not quite relearned kindness yet hopes that raha will pay for being such a hypocrite in a day she will never be around for after healing and breaking her heart all in one autumn afternoon.

* * *

**v. ???**

winter gives way to spring over and over and over again, summer turns to fall and the birds migrate south and the days become shorter and then longer in tandem.

it is many seasons after that unfinished confession when lunya finds the garden again, sequestered in a secret corner of the syrcus tower. the glass butterflies still flutter about after another century of stasis unbroken, but the room has changed— _grown_. there are more flowers now; a glittering array of hydrangeas and angelica, lilac and iris, lilies and anemone, each tended to with an obvious devotion. 

the garden is not all that has grown; when they were younger she wouldn't have pinned raha as someone capable of keeping even a succulent alive, but the crystarium and her people and her gardens are proof enough of his abilities as a leader. 

with great fondness and caution she tiptoes down the crystal steps, careful to not let the hems of her robes brush against the petals. there's a weathered plaque in the grass now, one that must have been hidden the last time she was here, for it's firmly planted in the center of the garden with no indication of ever being moved. a handful of years squinting over tomestones and breaking through allagan ruins means she knows what it reads:

_in his garden, there is hope._

_for desch, with love._

_—salina_.

desch must have been a kind person; princess salina entrusted so many hopes and dreams to him, and he carried on with that will when he did not have to. stubbornness and an overbearing sense of duty must simply run in the g tribe. as must an unyielding, all-consuming, unconditional love. 

as she stands in the refracted dawn, taking in the legacy of hundreds of thousands who came before her and the sacrifice of those who would see the future walk after, two arms—one warm and soft, the other crystalline and cool—encircle around her from behind. lunya leans back against a familiar chest, a curtain of crimson and snow brushing down over her shoulder as a purr rumbles at her back.

" _there_ you are," raha breathes against her ear, and a giggle breaks free from her when he buries his face down into the crook of her neck, drawing butterfly kisses against her nape. "i've been looking all over for you."

she sighs with the gentle push of a zephyr, wiggling around in his arms to look him in the eye. "my hair is a _mess_ —"

"you are as ethereal as usual," he interrupts as he sweeps her up into a bridal carry, bumping his nose to hers, and this time the weight of how truly he means it is not lost on her or to a fever-addled mind. "how fares the source?"

he still smells of vanilla and mint after all this time, and lunya relishes the scent as he weaves back through his garden to take a seat on the crystal steps. as he settles her back on the ground to stand between his legs, she hums, gathering starlight in hand while she thinks. it is hard to not be distracted by her beloved and how he carefully draws deft fingers through her hair, unknotting whatever tangles he can without a comb.

"hanami and reese will remain in ishgard, for the time being." with the welkin in her palms, she charts the course of her found family as easily as the path of the stars. the map she draws in the scarce distance between them glitters, the celestial outlines of aldenard and othard faint beneath the miniature stars that mark the bearers of the seventh dawn. "nini's taken over the gubal library since estinien left, _stupid dhalmel_. nyneve sends her love..."

as more stars bloom upon her magicked canvas, raha watches her patiently, dotting an acknowledging murmur here and there as she traces a winding path across the lands he has not seen but knows in his heart by her words.

"—and of course, krile hopes you are well." the glimmering map dissolves into starshine as she lowers her hands, pressing her palms against his thighs with a soft smile. "i hope you haven't been waiting long." 

"not this time," he assures her, pressing a kiss to her brow. "though in comparison to before…" 

it is true that a week means nothing compared to a century spent in wait, but she catches his chin in her small hand before he can pull back all the way. he seems well rested, for once—thanks to lyna and alisaie, for sure, and perhaps syhrwyda's motherly insistence—his vermillion eyes shining beautiful and clear at her as she cups his face in her palm, smoothing his bangs away with her other hand.

"whose fault was that?" she chides, no heat behind the words. they're a mess, the pair of them—two martyrs through and through. one life for all the worlds to come. but they're here _now_ , in the present, and that's what they've been working toward all this time, isn't it? "y'know, it's about time _you_ are selfish for once. you are allowed to say you missed me." the words are light, like they haven't already spent enough time yearning for each other already. 

raha only laughs, the sound effervescent and _right_ in the thin, early morning sunlight that slips through the walls of the tower.

"says the woman who crossed through the rift without so much as brushing her hair first," he teases, grinning boyishly at her. "but very well. i was as a garden with no flowers." his pitch slips into a half-whisper as he leans close again, sharing a secret just for two as he presses his forehead to hers. "the sun without warmth. the night without its stars. a bird without its song. a sail without the breeze."

lunya's breath catches in her throat. "you fiend," comes her low laugh as she stretches up, balancing on the tips of her boots to tangle a fist in his robes. "you _tease—_ "

"you said i could," he is too happy to remind her, beaming as she impatiently tugs at his collar. "a fever unbroken. like spring without life. a fireworks show unwatched—" she's shaking now with silent laughter that is equal parts delirious with glee and disbelief, and raha's crystal hand falls upon her hip, steadying her in place. the tilt of his wrist scatters crystallized starlight across their faces, painting them in the glow of the happily ever after they both deserve. "autumn turning to winter before the leaves can even fall."

her face, incandescent through embarrassment and adoration, serves only to drive raha's sly, affectionate smirk into a grin and then finally a smile so sweet it would surely taste like honey against her own.

"...like light without darkness. 'twas only a week," he accepts, utterly radiant. he brushes her hair behind her left ear, gently tapping the earring that hangs there. under his touch, the miniature aetheryte pulses beneath the harmony of the spheres, and together the tower and the crystal hum a quiet, ancient lullaby—the music of the universe. "but without you, i am a ship without her lodestar. an artist without his muse."

 _oh,_ her stupid, sweet boy. making her fall in love with him over and over and over again. 

"you have been through a lot, lord exarch." the whisper fans across his collar like a plume of phoenix down, carrying the warmth of a wish reborn. "i daresay you've seen many seasons change."

raha tilts his head at her, eyes scrunched with contentment. his tail has come to wind around her waist, and the tip light bats against her side. "indeed. but there is one i favour most especially."

her heart might already know, but still she prompts him, "and that is?"

the words come less easily than they had in that first winter of theirs, the edges of their memory softened by time, but raha devotedly recites: "scholars believe _five_ seasons existed during the time of the allagan empire, four of them being the ones we know of today."

this time, lunya does not interrupt, waiting for him with all the love she'd been too cowardly to wear on her sleeve in what feels like a lifetime ago. the time for pretense is long past. their smiles are mirrored on each other's face, a blinding set of sunlight and moonshine. 

"the fifth season is love," raha finally confesses, a truth three centuries in the making, one that can no longer be waylaid by any laws of mortal or divine making. maybe he didn't know the answer back then, or maybe he's known all this time. maybe it doesn't matter because lunya's too busy burying her face in his chest, overwhelmed by love for the man who fought the universe to save her.

"...raha," she says. his name is muffled against his heart, but as ever he answers in the space between her call and her next heartbeat, like his own follows the sound of her voice. 

"my inspiration." 

that warmth she had felt back when they were but twenty and twenty four and they had all the time in the world has not faded. if anything, it has grown stronger through the passage of time and space. it is the proximity of a theoretical sun, casting its light upon her, a sunbeam piercing through her heart like the truest flight of an arrow and with all the heat of vylbrand's summers. they are older now but no less foolish, and lunya would tear apart the rift and crush the stars beneath her own heel if it could mean keeping him by her side for all the seasons to come—winter, spring, summer, fall, _love._

"i love you," she tells him, not for the first time, but raha's face still glows so tender and so lovely lunya feels helpless under his gravity anyway. 

"and i, you," he manages to murmur before her restraint falls to pieces, collapsing to stardust as she grasps at his robes and drags him down into a kiss both fierce and soft, all but scrambling into his lap as his arms entwine around her once more, the sun and moon colliding as the spaces between hello and goodbye fade to nothingness. their embrace is a promise, one that sings _good morning, good morning, good morning, you will never wake up alone again._

the stars have returned home, the moon is bright and full, and her heart feels just as whole as every time she's understood how much she loves him before.  
  


**Author's Note:**

>  **every single mentioned oc from tumblr friends**  
>  a'satina lhea (sati-ffxiv)  
> coco cocoda (windupairship)  
> gyokuro yamashiro (whisperingdawn)  
> hanabi (umbral-heart)  
> hanami hagane (to-the-voiceless)  
> illya skawi (whitherlilliesbloom)  
> laurelis thyme (ofthesilverlining)  
> kirishimi yasuragi (windup-dragoon)  
> ninira nira (nuclearanomaly)  
> reese farouel (winduphaurchefant)  
> serella arcbane (stars-bleed-hearts-shine)  
> sun'li yhunja (clearsundays)  
> totomi tomi/mint (mintdrop)  
> rjoli asaed (verbroil)  
> zaya qestir, syhrwyda maetityrbwyn, tehra'ir naphto, a'dewah tia, lumelle and elwin de lipine (bolt-from-the-cobalt)
> 
>  **my own characters**  
>  nyneve pond, theodaux valerian, majj mistral, h'lios tia, einar howl, susuna suna


End file.
